3-pointers: Takeaways from Rockets' loss to Nets

Houston Rockets guard James Harden questions a cal during the first half of the team's NBA basketball game against the Brooklyn Nets, Friday, Nov. 1, 2019, in New York. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

Photo: Mary Altaffer/Associated Press

NEW YORK — Takeaways from the Rockets' 123-116 loss to the Brooklyn Nets on Friday night:

The Rockets could consider building another 15-point lead, as they had in their other loss, a good sign. If they are good enough to lead by 15 in the games they lose, they must be pretty good.

They also should know they could have lost each of the three wins. It might even be said they needed extra helpings of good fortune to win those games.

They are, at 3-2, ahead of last season’s start, but they cannot be considered to be playing well while defending so poorly. They got away with it at home against a pair of teams playing the second half of back-to-backs. They won in Washington when they scored 159 points.

They have not played consistently well this season, any more than they did Friday when they went from leading to trailing by 15.

When a question began with “all season,” James Harden smiled and said, “All season?”

A fair point. It is exceedingly early. But they have ample reason to believe progress must be made before it no longer feels as if things are just getting started.

1. Though no topic around the Rockets will generate as much conversation and coverage as the backcourt partnership of Harden and Russell Westbrook, they have made that irrelevant.

They play well together. Their ability to beat defenders off the dribble makes it difficult for teams to find options to stop them, even with Nets coach Kenny Atkinson holding up huge placards like a college football coach. They are both scoring well, and the Rockets offense has been the NBA’s best even while shooting badly from the 3-point line.

The Rockets’ issues are on the other end where they have played with sporadic intensity, leading to far too many breakdowns and a defense battling the Warriors’ for the league’s worst.

Some of the issues are the most basic, staying in front of the guy dribbling the basketball. But often there have been communication breakdowns, with possessions each game in which one player expects a switch, the other doesn’t and opponents enjoy the wide-open lane to the rim or 3-pointer that comes from it. The rotations from the “low man” have been routinely late.

Much of that is correctable. But the intensity has been unreliable. No defense works without it.

It has been there on occasion, though the Nets’ 10 turnovers in the first quarter were only marginally a credit to the Rockets’ defense. The Rockets’ intensity can be so fickle Friday that they rarely showed much competitive fire after turnovers. The Nets scored on five of the Rockets’ nine live-ball turnovers, on five of seven before the fourth quarter when the Rockets did bring the defensive urgency they have so often lacked.

When the Rockets have played with great defensive desire, as in the fourth quarter Friday, they have shown they can play well. But doing that only on occasion is like the bad teams that point out how often they are in games in the fourth quarter before they lose.

In the NBA, every team can have its moments. Every team can score. To have a chance to have a good defense, the intensity — which begins with effort but is as about focus and execution — must be there for much more than solid spurts.

The Rockets’ offense is so good that they can be in games and even build leads with a shoddy defense. That has allowed them to feel secure with leads when they should not.

“We see something great just because we can get up by 15,” Harden said. “We just got to figure out a way to take it to another level.”

There is little debate about where that has to be done. The 43.2 percent 3-point shooting the Rockets have allowed this season ranks as the worst 3-point defense in the NBA. The 126.6 points opponents are averaging is the most any team is giving up.

Overall, the Rockets defense ranks 29th, ahead of only the Warriors.

If they keep defending like that, that whole Harden-Westbrook thing is way beside the point, only in part because of how they are playing.

2. Clint Capela played less than 20 minutes Friday and is averaging just 27 minutes per game, fewer than in either of his past two seasons.

He played so little because Tyson Chandler played well in his 15 minutes off the bench and because the Rockets had their comeback from down 15 to within five in the fourth quarter when they went with small lineups and Capela did not play at all. But Capela played so little for a simple reason.

“It wasn’t a good 20 minutes,” Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni said. “To play 22 you got to play a good 20. That’s the bottom line. It wasn’t good enough.”

Capela did not defend or rebound well. He did not provide the rim protection the Rockets needed and did not get even one offensive rebound on a night the Rockets missed plenty of shots. In less than 20 minutes Capela was on the floor, the Rockets were outscored by 25.

That was not all on him or even close. His plus/minus did not benefit from being on the floor in the fourth quarter.

He did, in a way, demonstrate how important he is to the Rockets for them to be their best.

They need his defense. They need his energy. They need him to bring that reliably enough to play more minutes, bringing the rim running that can lead to more scoring inside or draw the defense to open more 3s outside.

In five games, Capela is averaging 14.8 points per game, down from last season, but generally enough. But his 8.2 rebounds are 4.5 fewer than last season and well off what the Rockets need from him. He is averaging 1.8 offensive boards.

The Rockets have no doubt that he will turn that around. On Friday, they saw that they need him to.

3. The Rockets tweaked their rotation Friday, moving Ben McLemore in for 21 minutes and giving Thabo Sefolosha his first DNP of the season.

McLemore has earned the playing time. He played a significant role down the stretch in the win against the Wizards. He had some moments on Friday. Sefolosha has struggled.

The change, however, does bring questions of whether the Rockets bench is too short both figuratively and literally.

It might have been a bit of a stretch to consider Sefolosha a backup power forward, but he is 6-6 and has the savvy to get it done in the Rockets’ system and in many matchups. McLemore is 6-3. That makes him the tallest Rockets player off the bench, along with Austin Rivers and Eric Gordon, other than Chandler.

Danuel House Jr. starts, but he can play some backup four as he did last season. He and McLemore play well with Westbrook running the second unit. The idea, however, was that Gordon would give that group offensive punch. Instead, he is making 28.6 percent of his shots and does not look comfortable.

Overall, the bench had a good game. Though outscored 27-19, that does not include Westbrook’s time with that group. Still, the change in the rotation showed that D’Antoni is searching, trying to come up with a rotation that he can stick with.

Jonathan Feigen has been the Rockets beat writer since 1998 and a basketball nut since before Willis Reed limped out for Game 7. He became a sports writer because the reporter that was supposed to cover the University of Delaware basketball team decided to instead play one more season of college lacrosse and has never looked back.

Feigen, who has won APSE, APME and United States Basketball Writers Association awards from El Campo to Houston, came to Texas in 1981 to cover the Rice Birds, was Sports Editor in Garland before moving to Dallas to cover everything from the final hurrah of the Southwest Conference to SMU after the death penalty.

After joining the Houston Chronicle in 1990, Feigen has covered the demise of the SWC, the rise of the Big 12 and the Rockets at their championship best.